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MADDISON — AUSTRALIA
Stillborn December 13, 2013 Prenatal-onset Mother's GBS Status: Tested positive Gestational Age: 34 weeks Age harmed: 34 weeks |
My pregnancy was relatively normal. I had experienced a couple of episodes of bleeding at 6 weeks then again at 16 weeks. While this was worrying at the time, everything always checked out. The my third trimester was absolutely normal, my baby girl was growing well and kicking constantly (how i miss those kicks :( ).
At 34 weeks I went for a regular check up with the midwives clinic. The night before I had felt her kicking away, although that previous week she had slowed down a little bit...I thought that was normal since I was coming close to full term. When I went for the check up, everything was normal; normal blood-work, normal fundal height etc. Then the midwife tried to find her heartbeat but couldn't. It didn't even cross my mind that she had passed away, I thought she may have been in an awkward position and the heartbeat was hard to find. The midwife assured me that this didn't mean anything and called in the doctor to find the heartbeat. He came within minutes and performed a bedside ultrasound. It took less then a minute. He told me my baby was gone. I broke down...I kept pinching myself because this had to be a nightmare...it was so unfair.
I was induced that night and my beautiful baby girl was born three days later. She was absolutely perfect, and that's the way I'll always remember her. We chose to have an autopsy to try to find some answers. Six weeks later we received the preliminary report. My baby girl was completely infected with group B strep. It was in her lungs, bloodstream and heart. I had had pap smears before I was pregnant and couldn't understand how I didn't know that I had GBS. My doctor told me that even if I had known, they don't treat women until labor anyway. Nothing could have prevented this. I'm so hurt that GBS stole my first baby from me...I had never even heard of GBS, let alone that I had it and what it would do to my life. I'm so sad to read of all the other mums who have experienced such pain, but I'm grateful for sites like the one. We need to raise awareness of GBS and research into preventing cross infection from mum to bub needs attention, especially considering that a quarter of women carry GBS. I will miss my baby forever, but I know that she is with me every second of every day. Every butterfly I see is her showing me that she is around, and I can't wait to be with her again. God bless all of you ladies. Our babies are all together, waiting for us to come home! Xxx
— Philippa de Jesus, Australia
At 34 weeks I went for a regular check up with the midwives clinic. The night before I had felt her kicking away, although that previous week she had slowed down a little bit...I thought that was normal since I was coming close to full term. When I went for the check up, everything was normal; normal blood-work, normal fundal height etc. Then the midwife tried to find her heartbeat but couldn't. It didn't even cross my mind that she had passed away, I thought she may have been in an awkward position and the heartbeat was hard to find. The midwife assured me that this didn't mean anything and called in the doctor to find the heartbeat. He came within minutes and performed a bedside ultrasound. It took less then a minute. He told me my baby was gone. I broke down...I kept pinching myself because this had to be a nightmare...it was so unfair.
I was induced that night and my beautiful baby girl was born three days later. She was absolutely perfect, and that's the way I'll always remember her. We chose to have an autopsy to try to find some answers. Six weeks later we received the preliminary report. My baby girl was completely infected with group B strep. It was in her lungs, bloodstream and heart. I had had pap smears before I was pregnant and couldn't understand how I didn't know that I had GBS. My doctor told me that even if I had known, they don't treat women until labor anyway. Nothing could have prevented this. I'm so hurt that GBS stole my first baby from me...I had never even heard of GBS, let alone that I had it and what it would do to my life. I'm so sad to read of all the other mums who have experienced such pain, but I'm grateful for sites like the one. We need to raise awareness of GBS and research into preventing cross infection from mum to bub needs attention, especially considering that a quarter of women carry GBS. I will miss my baby forever, but I know that she is with me every second of every day. Every butterfly I see is her showing me that she is around, and I can't wait to be with her again. God bless all of you ladies. Our babies are all together, waiting for us to come home! Xxx
— Philippa de Jesus, Australia
